Page:The Poor Rich Man, and the Rich Poor Man.djvu/192

184 with the nocturnal exhalations which, before morning, became sensible, even to smell, in a bedroom, the bedclothes were thrown over the backs of chairs, the mattresses shaken up, and the windows thrown open for the greater part of the day, so as to secure a thorough and cleansing ventilation."

"The opposite practice, carried to extremes in the dwellings of the poor, where three or four beds are often huddled up, with all their impurities, in a small room, is a fruitful source of fever and bad health, even where ventilation during the day, and nourishment, are not deficient."

"In eastern and warm countries, where perspiration is very copious, ablution and bathing have assumed the importance of religious observances."

"The warm, tepid, cold, or shower bath, as a means of pressing health, ought to be in as common use as a change of apparel, for it is equally a measure of necessary cleanliness."—"Our continental neighbours consider the bath as a necessary of life."

We hope the following remarks, which Mr Combe quotes from Stuart, the traveller, will be taken as a wholesome admonition, not as an unkind censure:—

"The practice of travellers washing at the doors, or in the porticoes or stoops, or at the wells of taverns and hotels, once a day, is most prejudicial to health; the ablution of the body, which ought never to be neglected, at least twice a day, being inconsistent with it. I found it more difficult, in travelling in the United States, to procure a liberal supply of water, at all times of the day, in my bedchamber, than any other necessary. A